Don’t Confuse Forgoing with Failure

Have you ever gotten to a point where every day you feel crazy busy, but absolutely nothing gets done?

That’s where I’ve been. For a long while. So, I’ve taken the last month or two to fully explore the reasons. After awhile, it became clear to me.

I’d gotten so absorbed with my projects – even the ones I didn’t love anymore – that I spent my time bouncing between projects but never completing any.

For awhile, I’ve been building up the website companion to the A Freelance Writer’s Guide To book series. I’ve also been trying to build up the website associated with my publishing imprint, which offers pre-publishing services for indie authors like editing, graphic design, and formatting.

Alongside these pursuits, I’ve had others.

It’s not that I particularly dislike any of these endeavors. It’s just that I got so busy trying to do everything at once that I lost sight of my overall goal. What I really want in life is to be an artist and a fiction author. I also like to write non-fiction, so I’m okay with freelance writing, but not the way I’ve been doing it.

So, after much soul searching, I came to the conclusion that I need to focus on the things I actually want to build a career doing. Namely writing and art.

I love blogging, so I’m keeping a couple of those up and running. My book review blog, my art site/blog, and this blog will all remain intact. But I’m shutting down my other websites.

Gasp, right? All those hours, all that time! That’s what I thought at first, too.

But more than the wasted hours, the thing that really bothered me was this idea that somehow I’d failed. That by taking down the sites and closing up shop, I’d admitted defeat.

After some reflection, though, I realized something. You can’t be defeated at something you never really wanted. All this time I’d been focused on the end result – earning money. There are countless ways to do that, and I was pursuing all of them.

Doing that left me scattered, and while I had lots of projects in the works, I couldn’t finish any of them. There just wasn’t enough time to pursue all of those things at time.

Because of this, I’ve decided to focus on the things I truly love. Writing/publishing, art, and books in general will be my focus. I’m excited about this, and I feel very free. In fact, making the decision to shut down my websites felt like a weight off my shoulders. That tells me everything I need to know.

I’m telling you this story to make a point that foregoing an option or project you’re not excited about to pursue something that does light you up isn’t failure. It’s just a way to pursue what you’re really meant to do.

That doesn’t mean you can’t do those other things later. Just don’t try to do everything at the same time. You’ll get a lot more done, and you’ll be much less stressed!

Have you experienced happy results after closing down a project you didn’t love? Let us know in the comments!